this summer we ended up with a lot of beach treasures, so rather than let them sit in buckets in our shed all winter long, this pinspiration (courtesy of beachcomber) made me want to give these beauties a new (and festive!) life.

remember our trip to a nearby salvage yard? well, we scored this distressed cabinet door for under $5, which made for a perfect backdrop to our driftwood christmas tree. N and i gathered up various sizes of driftwood, and began our work.

driftwood itself is just so lovely.

N was a huge help in organizing the pieces of driftwood by length.

then she set to work lining them up on the board in a tree pattern. after she arranged them how she liked them, i hot glued the wood to the board.

once they were glued down, we sourced more beachy items (starfish for “tree topper” and shells and sea glass for “ornaments”) and N “decorated the christmas tree” with them.

thankfully, she didn’t clump them all in one spot (like she did on our actual christmas tree!)

it’s just so fun to look at!

and it makes for a handsome holiday mantel!

okay, so i keep blogging about projects from pinterest that i want to do (not necessarily child-centered – ack!) but at least N helped a great deal with this one, right…??? and she LOVES it… does that count? [insert sheepish grin here.]

Love this, Jen! It’s gorgeous. Unfortunately, driftwood isn’t something we find on our beaches in quantity (or quality, really). We DO find lots of clam shells, though, so I turned them into candles.

(I put my own crafty/creative stuff in another blog entirely. Mama needs to make stuff too!!)

http://www.mysalvagedtreasures.blogspot.com Betsy

Fabulous project! I love the simplicity of the driftwood and that starfish tree topper is perfect. I’d be so tempted to leave this up all year long!

http://www.shefoundstyle.com Betsy T

I’ve got a ton of driftwood just outside my front door! Every time we walk to the beach I wonder what cool things I could be doing with it. Now I know!! Great tree, I love it. I think we’ll give it a try this afternoon.

This is so beautiful! My family goes to the beach during the summer and they usually collect rocks, but this year we are looking for driftwood. What a great way to remember the summer during the winter. I also like that you could keep it up after Christmas b/c it’s not your typical red & green Christmas decoration.